﻿TINEINA BRED FROM COTTON-BOLLS. 205 



" The young caterpillar is white, with a dark head, and is found feeding on the 

 leaves or on the outside of the boll. It does not immediately attack the boll but 

 bores in through the rind when it has fed for a few days outside. It feeds upon 

 the oily seeds, eating seed after seed until it has become full grown. As a rule 

 one will be found in a boll but exceptionally several attack the same boll. The 

 full grown larva is of a white colour, with bright pink spots. The larval life 

 varies in duration according to the season but occupies two or three weeks in the 

 active period. The full grown larva forms a slight cocoon of silk, in the boll or 

 on the bracts or leaves of the cotton. The shortest period for the pupa is from 

 fourteen to eighteen days, after which the moth emerges." (MaxwelULefroy.) 1 



Although originally described from Indian specimens it is by no means certain 

 that gossypiella is truly an Indian species, for Dr. Barn's notes, as published by 

 Saunders, 1 indicate strongly that the insect was imported with American cotton, 

 which it preferred to the Indian species of Gossypium. Swinhoe and Cotes 3 

 record gossypiella from Cawnpore with a " ? " — this mark of doubt is misplaced, 

 the specimen was correctly determined as gossypiella, Sndrs., the " ? " had 

 reference to its being wrongly described as a Depressaria by Saunders, 

 (Durrant and Meyrick have both referred gossypiella to Gelechia, Hb.) 



No special information accompanied this Cawnpore specimen (labelled " Cotton, 

 VI. 1883 "), but in the accumulation of " Notes on insect pests from the 

 Entomological Section, Indian Museum," published by the late Lionel de 

 Niceville in Indian Museum Notes, Vol. V., No. 3 (1903), we find (p. 183) under 

 Earias fabia that Egyptian cotton was grown on the experimental farm at 

 Cawnpore. It is therefore presumable that this specimen of gossypiella was 

 associated with imported Egyptian cotton. We also read (I.e., p. 183) that: 

 " On 4th December, 1893, the Director of Land Records and Agriculture, 

 Punjab, Lahore, sent some pods [bolls] of Egyptian cotton, containing green and 

 white insects tunnelling into the pods. A single moth was bred from these, but 

 was unidentified." This bred specimen was regarded as probably a variety of 

 Earias fabia, but it has been overlooked that Gelechia gossypiella was also bred 

 from these Lahore cotton bolls. Two specimens were sent to Merton (6010-11 

 Mus. Wlsm.) with the note " Cotton-boll moth reared from caterpillars from 

 Lahore" (Cotes, i.l., 19.11.1894) — these were determined as Gelechia gossypiella, 

 Sndrs. (1176-7 Drnt. det. 1894). It would therefore seem that both the 

 Lahore and Cawnpore specimens were imported with Egyptian cotton. We 

 have no information as to the probable origin of the Surat specimens recorded 

 by Meyrick 5 and may therefore assume that their history is similar to that of 

 the other Indian specimens. Mr. Perkins notes the Hawaiian specimens as 

 il Tineid of cotton (introduced) " — unfortunately he gives no indication of the 

 locality whence it came — and at present we have no evidence that the species 

 occurs in America, but a single specimen from Japan (70795, Mus. Wlsm.) in 

 a very poor condition would seem to be gossypiella. 8 



The suggestion that Gelechia gossypiella, Sndrs., was imported into India with 

 Egyptian cotton, and thence distributed eastward receives some support since 

 it has been bred in Egypt by Mr. F. C. Willcocks from larvae collected in the 

 Damanhour District, and in Zanzibar by Dr. W. M, Aders. Specimens from 



